Nintendo's new cloud service for backing up saves is a good idea in theory. If the worst happens to your console you can continue your adventures on a new system without breaking a save-data-loss-themed sweat. Backups are even handled automatically, so you needn't worry about remembering to do it yourself all the time.

But there are still a few problems, as discussed in the video above. The primary one being that certain titles including Nintendo's flagship Splatoon 2 don't support this service, presumably to prevent abusing save files to improve your in-game gear. So if you want to have a look at how it all works before diving in yourself, check out the video above to see the process in action.

It's also worth pointing out that at the moment, the backup process doesn't seem to be automated for everyone when it comes to software you already have on your console. Within the ranks of the Nintendo Life team we've had reports of backups happening really slowly, while other staffers have had no automated backups at all. Nintendo may well be limiting how the system works in these early days to avoid clogging things up - but as it stands, you may have to manually upload cloud saves for existing games. Any new game you play will have its data uploaded the moment you close it down.

To update cloud save data for existing titles, all you need to do is open a game which already has save data stored on the console, then exit the game immediately. This will force the upload to occur. However, this only seems to work when your cloud upload is set to 'Pending'. To check the status of each game's save upload, head over to the Settings menu, select Data Management then select Save Data Cloud Backup. From this screen, you can clearly see which games have save data support, which ones have data on your console and which ones have been successfully backed up to the cloud. You'll also see which games are in the 'pending' state.

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If you click on one of these pending games, you'll notice that you don't have the option to manually force the upload. Instead, the game waits until you open it, then uploads the save data once it is closed down. However, by pressing X on the save management screen, you can cancel the pending upload and then select a manual one. This means you don't have to open and close every single game to get the data uploaded - a painfully long-winded process.

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As we've already noted, this process will most likely become entirely automated for everyone as time goes on, but for the time being, getting that lovely save data into the cloud isn't as streamlined a process as you might assume.